It takes a profound hypocrisy to try to reconcile for others things that you can’t reconcile for yourself.
"The disingenuous Professor Ruse" July 29, 2012 |
Some believers are fundamentalists about everything, but every believer is a fundamentalist about something.
Jerry CoyneIn religion , faith is a virtue. In science , faith is a vice.
Jerry CoyneTheology is the post hoc rationalization of what you want to believe.
Jerry CoyneThe fact that both Jews and Christians ignore some of God’s or Jesus’s commands, but scrupulously obey others, is absolute proof that people pick and choose their morality not on the basis of its divine source, but because it comports with some innate morality that they derived from other sources.
Jerry CoyneCome on, readers, give me one example of a question that religion has answered to everyone’s satisfaction one example of a “truth” found in religion’s quest for truth.
Jerry CoyneBut this (a listing of illustrations of how the genome can change other than by mutations) doesn’t constitute a crisis it’s a very interesting finding that shows that variation in a genome can arise by processes other than mutation of an organism’s own DNA. The disposition of that variation still must occur via either natural selection (it can be good or bad) or genetic drift (no effect on fitness). This hasn’t really changed the theory of evolution one iota, though it’s changed our view of where organisms can acquire new genes.
Jerry CoyneDamn, but science is just a constant feed of cool new facts and theories. Theology doesn’t come close.
Jerry CoyneWhy, exactly, are scientists supposed to accord “respect” to a bunch of ancient fables that are not only ludicrous on their face, but motivate so much opposition to science?
Jerry CoyneFaith is a padlock of the mind, and few keys can open it.
Jerry CoyneIn the end theologians are jealous of science, for they are aware that it has greater authority than do their own ways of finding “truth”: dogma, authority, and revelation. Science does find truth, faith does not.
Jerry CoyneCan a geology teacher blithely tell his students that the earth is flat, or a European history professor that the Holocaust didn’t happen? That’s not academic freedom, but dereliction of duty.
Jerry CoyneHe is a dissimulator, a back-pedaler, a coward, and a self-serving ignoramus. In other words, he’s a politician.
Jerry CoyneThe battle for evolution seems never-ending. And the battle is part of a wider war, a war between rationality and superstition.
Jerry CoyneThis book lays out the main lines of evidence for evolution. For those who oppose Darwinism purely as a matter of faith, no amount of evidence will do theirs is a belief not based on reason.
Jerry CoyneIt’s clear that this resistance stems largely from religion. You can find religions without creationism, but you never find creationism without religion.
Jerry CoyneWe humans have many vestigial features proving that we evolved. The most famous is the appendix.
Jerry CoyneTiny, nonfunctional wings, a dangerous appendix, eyes that can’t see, and silly ear muscles simply don’t make sense if you think that species were specially created.
Jerry CoyneWe now have many of the answers that once eluded Darwin, thanks to two developments that he could not have imagined: continental drift and molecular taxonomy.
Jerry CoyneIf you can’t think of an observation that could disprove a theory, that theory simply isn’t scientific.
Jerry CoyneIf the history of science teaches us anything, it is that what conquers our ignorance is research, not giving up and attributing our ignorance to the miraculous work of a creator.
Jerry CoyneBecause of the hegemony of fundamentalist religion in the United States, this country has been among the most resistant to the fact of human evolution.
Jerry CoyneEvolution tells us where we came from, not where we can go.
Jerry CoyneA well-understood and testable hypothesis like sexual selection surely trumps an untestable appeal to the inscrutable caprices of a creator.
Jerry CoyneScience has only two things to contribute to religion: an analysis of the evolutionary, cultural, and psychological basis for believing things that aren’t true, and a scientific disproof of some of faith’s claims (e.g., Adam and Eve, the Great Flood). Religion has nothing to contribute to science, and science is best off staying as far away from faith as possible. The “constructive dialogue” between science and faith is, in reality, a destructive monlogue, with science making all the good points, tearing down religion in the process.
Jerry Coyne